Chelsea v Aston Villa

Chelsea vs Aston Villa Preview

Chelsea are in desperate need to start picking up points in the Premier League after having made a disappointing start to this new campaign and The Blues will take on Aston Villa at Stamford Bridge on Sunday afternoon looking to kick-start their season with a win here.

Chelsea's poor start is in stark contrast to the significant financial outlay that the club spent during the summer transfer window and with the hosts now occupying a poor 14th place in the Premier League table with just one win under their belts so far, manager, Mauricio Pochettino, will be under increasing pressure for his expensively assembled side to start picking up results.

Chelsea's singular success so far in this new campaign was a 3-0 home win against the newcomers, Luton Town, who sit rock-bottom of the table but although Chelsea have also picked up points in draws with Liverpool 1-1 on the opening day of the season along with sharing the spoils with Bournemouth down on the south coast, two defeats within this opening five-game period have made an early dent in Chelsea's ambitions.

Losses to West Ham and Nottingham Forest have prevented the London club from lifting themselves up into at least a top half position, while the bigger picture shows Chelsea have managed to capture just two wins from their previous 17 matches overall in the English top flight.

Aston Villa have produced a reasonable start to their new Premier League campaign as the west midlands club have picked up three wins out of their opening five games of this new season which has helped the visitors up into an early seventh place position, a position that Chelsea themselves would have been expecting to be occupying by now.

Victories against Everton, Burnley and Crystal Palace have seen Villa make the most of matches and opponents that they should be picking up points against so it's a case of mission accomplished in that regard, but the visitors have also slipped to two defeats so far this season as well.

Losses against Newcastle United 5-1 on the opening day of the season along with a 3-0 loss at Anfield against Liverpool were bad enough but both of these defeats were handed to Aston Villa on the road which makes this upcoming trip to Stamford Bridge a potentially tough one for Unai Emery's side.

Indeed, Villa have managed to collect just one win from their previous seven outings on the road in the Premier League and have also been handed four defeats within this sequence of results as well, so the visitors are by no means guaranteed a result here on Sunday.

Chelsea v Aston Villa Verdict

Chelsea have lost the last two meetings on the trot to Aston Villa but the hosts do stand a decent chance of returning to winning ways here against a Villa side that have struggled away from home in recent times.

Therefore, our main bet will be Chelsea win @ 1.83

Other side bets worth considering:

Chelsea win & Under 2.5 goals @ 5.00

Correct score: Chelsea 1-0 @ 10.00